Glorious
by Yanrev
Summary: Sometimes tragedy brings about reflection, and sometimes reflection brings about change. Hinata reflects on her life and decides it's time to bring about change, and these changes in turn spark others to reflect on their own lives.
1. Prologue

So, this is my first ever Naruto fic, and it'll probably be around maybe ten chapters or so. The song Glorious by **Muse** inspired me to write this fic, and a few other Muse songs inspired me to write other Naruto fics. Guess Muse is just an awesome inspiration. ;) For those of you that are strict with the Narutoverse, I'll go ahead and say that I took some liberties with this story just as an fyi. I absolutely love reviews, so please feel free to leave them, and I'll state now that **I do not own Naurto or any of the characters from the series that are trademarked. **There, now please enjoy and drop a line -even if it's to say that you didn't like it!

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_'Touch my face,_  
_ A hopeless embrace'_

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He swore he could feel her fingers running through his hair, like phantom kisses to his scalp. Combing through the long tendrils and braiding them loosely as her off key humming overwhelmed all else. It was those rare moments when all else ceased to matter, when the world was nothing more than her grand stage to act upon without a ploy. His eyes shifted then, the colorful blurs intensifying and tracing outlines before him as he quietly wondered –was this the part of life that he was to remember? They always said that when Death was upon you, you had a flash of your entire life come before you, and while he was most certain that his life was coming to a close, he couldn't help but be slightly amused that that was the only thing he had to show for it. That one moment, however fond, was the only thing that zipped through his slowing brain cells.

Faintly, he could hear something tickling his eardrums, and while his sight still wasn't the sharpest, he knew that she stood before him. She was watching him, her gaze piercing through his flesh and blood and right into the very soul that she had unknowingly completed. He grimaced, straining to lift his arms so that he could pull her to him, have her closer than he had ever allowed himself. Closer than even his dreams would allow, but his limbs refused him as if to say that this very moment was why all things should be said and done in the present instead of the future that none could guarantee. He slowly breathe, focusing his dwindling chakra so that he could use his remaining moments to do what he felt needed to be done.

It worked.

He focused upon her as he spoke quietly to Naruto, his gaze never relenting as he memorized her every feature. Drinking in her disheveled, battle worn appearance; the way her hair fell around her frame like dark ink, the way her matured physique swayed obliviously with her grief. He was utterly surprised, however, the way her tears fell in such open rivulets. His heart ached more than it did from the gaping hole within it, and soon enough his lips ceased to move as he watched her near him. Watching her cry for him was far too much, like a pain that even his current critical condition couldn't hold a point to, but he could not look away. Like a moth to a flame, if he was to leave this world then she would most certainly be the last thing he saw.

His head never touched the ground as the blonde laid him down, and although he was certain Naruto had gone on about a med nin, he was more concerned with the way she had pooled his hair around him like a halo and began to stroke his face. Was he breaking her? Was he going to be her undoing after she had bloomed so beautifully since their initial meeting? He wanted so desperately to touch her, to finally give in to that insatiable desire that had eaten away at him for years. He wanted to kiss her until she took his very breath away, to hold her and make her heart the only melody he'd hear, to tell her everything he hadn't the courage to tell her before.

How he loved her, and always had.

How that love had made him hate her in the beginning because of its ferocity and his inability to cope with it.

How she was the only person able to get under his skin and into his bones.

How her relentless need to suffer in silence fueled his loud passion to punish others.

How he wished to hold her hands so that they would never cover her face again.

How awful and unfit of a lifelong partner he thought Naruto would be for her.

How much potential she had coursing through her veins if only she'd be selfish for once in her life.

These things and more he would like to vocalize, but the taste of copper made him rethink attempting to speak, he would rather not soil her anymore if he could. His eyes softened as his Byakugan deactivated, and slowly he realized that it was now or never. Summoning his remaining strength, his fingers found their way around the slightly tattered remains of her sleeve, tugging as forcefully as he could. "Y-you shouldn't m-move," Her stutter had returned for the occasion, he thought with an almost sarcastic amusement, "cons-serve y-your ch-"

"Hinata-sama."

His voice was barely audible, but powerful nonetheless, and as pale eyes connected, his last dying thought was that she knew.

She knew.


	2. o1

She had been pleasantly surprised when she had been summoned to entertain a visitor, and even more so when she stepped into the room and caught sight of said visitor. She couldn't help but briefly wonder where her father and Hanabi had run off to, but quickly set it aside. Straightening her posture, she quietly padded onto the tatami, stopping directly in front of her visitor before gracefully lowering herself onto her knees. She stared at the dark locks attached to the bowed head before her, taking in the richness of their color momentarily, but then quickly shifting her gaze elsewhere when he sat back. Feeling his eyes immediately, and unabashedly, boring into her -through her.

"Uchiha-san."

Her voice was soft, showing her pure femininity, yet firm, reminding him that she too was a kunoichi. Obsidian orbs stared impassively at the heiress, trying to catch the pearls heavily laced with dark lashes fruitlessly. The silence that filled the room was more honest than any words that could be spoken, but he knew that he would need to speak so that he could be on his way. "I've come to pay my respects," His voice was like liquid steel, and he was faintly aware that Hinata hadn't wished for him to break the silence, "Hyūga Neji was a formidable and brilliant shinobi." He watched her lips move to inhale, and he then suddenly found the scenario incredibly tiring. Allowing his tongue to lightly suck against the roof of his mouth, he rolled his eyes and stared at the fine weaving of a loom that hung to his left. He would easily admit that they were strangers, and that he perhaps was the last person the young woman would want to see, but he couldn't shake his growing aggravation at the awkwardness of it all.

He cleared his throat, wincing at its guttural sound, and resisted the urge to run his fingers through his locks in frustration. "Uchiha-san," Almost so low it could've easily been considered inaudible, he turned to her, "thank you for coming." His eyes narrowed as if to test her sincerity, but when she finally turned to match his gaze, albeit swiftly, he could see no falsehood. He nodded curtly, and slowly stood up then, taking that at his cue to depart. He heard her stand also as he began to walk towards the entrance, feeling her low hum of chakra as he stepped into his sandals, but as he reached for the door, he paused. He was waiting, knowing that somehow there was just a bit more to be had before he could completely leave the Hyūga compound. "Uchiha-san.." There, there it was, right there.

"Uchiha-san," His ears perked when he heard her exhale slowly, as if afraid she wouldn't properly enunciate, "whatever it is you're going to do, please don't." He looked back at her, his face devoid of any expression, and he saw something that unnerved him greatly. He saw wisdom, pain, sorrow, and worst of all, understanding. He saw all of these things taunting him, and wanted to end her life then and there, just because she dared. She dared. Instead, however, she glanced away and offered a stuttered apology, and he turned back around and silently left, not bothering to glance back at all. He had come here to pay his condolences that much was true, Hyūga Neji was perhaps one of few that couldn't be held in justifiable contempt in his book, but he hadn't come to deal with some foolish woman. He had barely been able to come up with her name when the acting guards had subdued him at the gate, and yet she had had the audacity to supply him with her unwarranted warning?

He scoffed darkly and began to merge into the spreading darkness of dusk, reassuring himself that this sudden anger blazing through his veins was not due to some timid mouse who decided to forget her place in the world and be cheeky.


	3. o2

I would like to thank you guys for reviewing, and apologize for the huge update lag. I posted two chapters hopefully to make up for that! Please read and review and let me know what's on your mind!

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_Rose-tinted view_

_And satellites that compromise the truth_

_I wanted more - _**Muse**

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She didn't make a sound as she hit the ground, her pale hand slowly cupping her swiftly bruising cheek, and that simply infuriated the brunette further. Brown eyes narrowed, their emotional volume heighted by the tears spilling helplessly from them as they looked on at the offending party. It had been a whole two weeks before they could properly bury Neji, and during the duration she had not seen one ounce of sorrow from the heiress other than the dried stains that had collected on her face when she was dragged from his corpse. How could she be so calm now, when all others were racked with grief and melancholy? How could she stand there, solid and immovable, as he was lowered into the ground for his final resting place? How could this one Hyūga be so passive and disconnected while the other clan members were discombobulated and torn?

She felt her fists curl tightly, almost straining her veins and muscles as she did so, and fought back a large growl that was threatening to spill from her lungs. TenTen had been utterly broken by the news, unable to cope but knowing that she would have to mourn with everyone else least she lose herself in her hurt. And so she sought out perhaps the only other person whose pain could hope to parallel her own, only to find that that person was in no way grieving at all. Hinata had quietly comforted her, but never once joined in with her sobs and emotional thrashings, and it had slowly begun to fester and make her furious with the heiress. She had swallowed that fury, but with time it only grew in size until it overwhelmed her being and burst on the most exhausting day of her seventeen years of life. So when the service had finished and the mourners began to take their leave, she had promptly stormed over to Hinata and punched her with all her might.

Still, she wasn't sated, there was more to be done.

"You don't have the decency to even cry at his funeral after he sacrificed his life for you!"

Nothing, there was no response, not even from the few onlookers too shocked by the occurrence.

"So you've nothing to say for yourself? No half assed apology to offer up? No stuttered utterances?"

Still, nothing.

Losing her cool, TenTen pulled her arm back once more so that Hinata's other cheek could sport a matching hue, but was surprised to find her fist instead tightly held by Hinata's own. Brown intensely met white, but TenTen would not be pacified so easily. "Do you know how it feels to be so pathetically in love and hopelessly devoted to a person that is pathetically in love and hopelessly devoted to someone else? To know that no matter what you do or say, that you will never take the crowning reign of their heart, that you will always perhaps be second best at the most?" Startled slightly, Hinata gave a slow nod at the girl's inquiries, her mind swiftly flashing images of a certain blonde. TenTen gave a loud, watery laugh in response, lowering her head as she shook it, "Duh. Of course you do, how stupid of me to forget that."

She looked up as Hinata slowly began to lower her fist and attempt to massage it open, but TenTen snatch her fingers away, allowing them to drop to the ground as her knees involuntarily gave way beneath her into a graceless kneel. "I never told him how I felt because he already knew, and I never chased after him because I knew that there wasn't any use pretending he was something I could conquer. He could never completely see me because he could never completely see anything outside of you. You, Hinata, you were the only thing that ever mattered to him. He was consumed by your very being and you had no damn idea. He loved you more than he loved life, power, and even himself. Just you, only you, nothing but you. How the fuck can someone even think of trying to compete with that huh?"

She could see Hinata's mind moving behind her eyes, and she grabbed the girl's shoulders as if to keep her from fleeing. "I loved him, and he loved you, and you loved goddamn Naruto. And he died not for Konohagakure, not for the shinobi, and not even for honor, but for you. For you because you love Naruto so much that you'd risked your life for him, and he in turn gave his life for yours. He did that, he did that because his love for you was so outrageous…so demanding..that you were his life. His everything, a-and..even if you hadn't been there, he still would have protected Naruto because he knew. He knew that you'd be so devastated. But what about me? Huh? W-WHAT ABOUT M-ME NEJI?! HUH?! WHAT ABOUT ME? WHAT ABOUT-" Grabbing TenTen completely, Hinata muffled the girls screams and held her tightly, keeping her grip solid as the brunette violently began to struggle within her hold.

She yelled, she screamed, she sobbed, and she bit.

She mourned in a way that she hadn't been able to in the past few weeks, and Hinata in turn simply closed her eyes and began to rock them both slowly, ignoring the small aches being inflicted by the distraught, heartbroken teenager in her arms. Hinata's mind was out of control, chaotic with all the information and emotions threatening to burst through the carefully crafted dam she had constructed. But this was what it all boiled down to, this was why she couldn't afford to allow her own grief to consume her, she had to attempt to mend all the broken hearts and tend to all the broken spirits. Being a kunoichi sometimes meant more than being a warrior, sometimes it meant simply being whatever was needed of you, and throughout Hinata's life she realized that that was something she could readily do.

So she continued to hold her friend, sometimes quietly whispering things to console her, sometimes seemingly nodding her head in response to whatever the brunette would say. Still, as time silently slipped by, and it appeared that they were the only living souls in the vicinity, she couldn't help but feel her eyes creeping every so often towards the treetops of the dense forest shrouding the graveyard. She could feel someone's eyes trying to penetrate her, as if they wanted to see into her very essence.

And hers alone.


End file.
